Coke for a Birthday Present, Part 2
by Emmeline Springs
Summary: Patton finally remembers what he should have never forgotten... and soon after, makes an huge mistake. Can Rachel forgive him?


**Coke for a Birthday Present, Part 2**

Patton, or Number 60, was sitting on his bed at home, flipping through a book without reading the words. His mind was elsewhere. He was trying to remember what had happened almost a full two days ago. Before today, all he had was one memory… and that was just a flash of Rachel, or Number 362,'s face, blushing red and smiling her rare smile.

He sighed and turned the page. "What _happened_?" He hissed to himself, dropping the book and flopping back on the bed, slapping his forehead.

With that slap came all the memories he needed.

He inhaled in shock at what he had said. He sat straight up and jumped out of bed. "What did I _do_?" he exclaimed.

But the longer he thought about it, the more he realized that he might have been doing true…

Rachel, or Number 362 a.k.a. Supreme Leader, lay on calm, swaying grass in the park. She sighed and closed her eyes, not about to let her feelings get the best of her when for years she had tried so hard to suppress them. The gentle breeze tickled her delicate cheek and her skin had no color to it. Her blush from almost two days ago was gone. Children laughed around her, unaware that life could be so hard, so trying. It triggered the small part of her that he had left vulnerable… to kiss her… and she had thought… but no, she musn't think like that. She must control her emotions…

"He is nothing," she whispered to herself, almost silent. "I should not feel this. I _don't_ feel this. He is _nothing_."

"You didn't seem to think that yesterday," said a quiet voice from right beside her.

She sat up and whirled her head around to the ground next to her, only to see Patton, of all people, lying right next to her. She jumped up and her eyes sparked fire, yet no color returned to her cheeks.

"Why are you here, Number 60?" she asked, her voice flat but slightly furious.

He frowned. "Call me Patton. And I'm here to fix the mistake I made."

"Mistake?"

"I remember what happened yesterday. And-"

"So kissing me was a mistake?"

"No! That's not what-"

"Telling me that you loved me was a mistake?"

Her voice raising and a faint color to her cheeks, his mind almost stopped working. Her blue eyes were sparking with emotion and her blonde hair was artfully disheveled. His mind was so wrapped around her unquestionable beauty that he did not hear what he said next. But she did. She heard the faint 'yes' that he spoke, the glimmer in his eyes that she misconstrued…

But she lost all her fury. She simply could not fight anymore. He had broken the very part of her that made her… well, _her_. And she wasn't sure that a break that large could be mended.

"Oh," she whispered, her eyes swimming. "I didn't realize that I was such a horrible person to love."

"What?" Patton asked, seeing her abrupt change in personality. He hopped to his feet from the ground where he had been. "Wait, what?"

"You just said that all of that was a mistake," she mumbled, one single tear leaving where it should not have left. Her eyes would not look up at him, but rather at the ground he was just on. "That… that kissing me, and telling me you loved me, and… I didn't… I mean, I…"

"Shhh," he told her, his finger on her perfect lips.

She smiled softly at him, meeting his eyes, and then raised her hand to gently push his off. "I hope you know how deep the water gets in this ocean you're swimming in, because if you don't, you might drown in it. And believe it or not," she told him, pausing in her sentence to kiss him lightly, "that's something neither of us want."

With that, she pulled away and began walking into the shade of the trees.

He watched her walk away, everything not sinking in until she had disappeared into the distance.

The pounding on her bedroom door would not stop. As she heard yet another knock, she exhaled grumpily and slid out of her bed to once again tell her parents that she was fine.

But the face behind the door was anybody but her parents.

"Patton?" she exclaimed, shocked.

He smiled at her and held out the six-pack of coke in his hands. "I thought that maybe I should explain… while we drink what caused me to have to do so."

She grinned. She couldn't help it. It just spread, so naturally. "Come on in," she told him, opening the door wider and allowing him to step through.

"Thanks," he said, plopping down on her bed and patting next to him for an invitation to sit.

Her smile disappeared and she crossed her arms over her chest… but not crossly. Merely as a protection. "What do you have to say?"

He sighed and his smile vanished also. "I have a lot to say. Where would you like me to start?"

She shrugged. "The beginning, I guess."

"Alright," he said. "The beginning."

She waited. He waited. Then he took the first step.

"Well, I'm sorry, for one," he said quietly. "And I want you to know that I think you are the most beautiful girl that the world has ever had… the only one that's truly beautiful."

"Define beautiful."

He grinned for about a second before becoming serious again. "You think things through, but you wouldn't if you didn't have to. You know responsibility and you treat it as if it were an infant and you were in charge of it, yet you wish you weren't, because you have a side that likes to be social. But you are afraid of love, because you've never known it before. At least, that's what you think. But I know that you're scared because of the KND."

Her eyes narrowed. "The KND does not scare me."

"I'm not talking of you being scared of the KND."

"Then what are you talking about?" she asked, confusion taking over.

"I'm talking about you being scared that you would have to pick the KND over me if somebody got me in an attempt to get to you. I know that it might happen. But I want you to know that I would want you to pick the KND. I'm loyal to them. I am one! But I don't care. If that's the reason for us not being together, then I want you to stop thinking about it."

"I was under the assumption that everything you had said and done was a 'mistake'."

"It wasn't," he said. "_Saying_ that it was a mistake was the mistake."

She raised an eyebrow. "Come again?"

His eyes were wide and persuasive as he said, "Just think about it."

She inhaled and then exhaled. "Alright," she said finally, nodding her head. "I will."

"Thanks," he said to her, wrapping one arm around her and rubbing her shoulder affectionately. "I'll be waiting."

She watched him leave before turning back to the unopened six-pack on her bed. She cautiously picked one of them up and opened it. Right before drinking, she whispered, "To us, Patton."


End file.
